The cute little girl next to me on the plane was four years old and dressed in Hello Kitty clothes from head to toe. Her name was Alexandria and she had shining black hair. Her shoes were silver-sequinned Hello Kitty slippers, her pink leggings and pink T-shirt had Hello Kitty decorations, and she had a Hello Kitty barrette in her hair. I wasn't surprised when halfway through the flight she took out a pink Hello Kitty game console and started playing games (with annoying little dings every time she did something correctly, which made the people around us turn to glare).
The little girl, of course, couldn't read or write, but like all the children of this generation, was completely at home with the technology. She spoke English as her native language, but with a Texas Mexican accent-- her grandmother, sitting next to her, was a native Spanish speaker who was resolutely speaking only English to the child, although with a strong Mexican-Spanish accent.
When I glanced at the screen, though, I was surprised to see that the little girl was playing the game in French! The grandmother told me it was in English. I wonder if she was illiterate.
